In their hands
they hold their nakaras (timbrels), clashing them together above their
heads as they whirl around; on their feet are bronze bangles; and their
long tresses and their light bulging garments flutter around them,
whilst with wild gesticulations they dance the most audacious of dances,
compared with whose voluptuous movements the passion of the fiercest
Spanish bailarina is almost tame and spiritless.
Suddenly one of these street dancing-girls scream aloud to her
companions in the midst of the mazy dance, bringing them suddenly to a
standstill.
"Look, look!" she cried, "there comes Guel-Bejaze! Guel-Bejaze, the wife
of Halil Patrona."
"Guel-Bejaze! Guel-Bejaze!" resound suddenly on every side. The bayaderes
recognise the woman who had been shut up with them in the same dungeon,
surround her, begin to kiss her feet and her garments, raise her up in
their arms on to their shoulders, and so exhibit her to all the women
assembled together on the piazza.
"Yonder is the wife of Halil Patrona!" they cry, and Rumour quickly
flies with the news all through the city. Everyone of the bayaderes
dancing among the people has something to say in praise of her. Some of
them she had cared for in sickness, others she had comforted in their
distress, to all of them she had been kind and gentle. And then, too, it
was she who had restored them their liberty, for was it not on her
account that Halil Patrona had set them all free?
Everyone hastened up to her.
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